NEW ZEALAND : GENERAL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVIII, Issue 52, 27 December 1900, Page 20

NEW ZEALAND : GENERAL.

In consequence of the unusual pressure upon our space several reports are unavoidably held over until next issue, atd several others appear in condensed form. Messrs. Mills, Dick and Co., of Dunedin, have just issued thpir Otago, Southland, and South Canterbury Almanac and Directory for 1901. As usual, this publication is up to date in every respect, and the proprietors may well claim that they live up to tLcir motto — Quod faci^xtts ""i** faci*»-»i*. It meets the requirements of all classes in the community, and is invaluable to the l.Uohic-.3 man and the farmer in those districts that it deals with. Otf December 1 the Convent school at Darfield was examined by Mr. Baldwin (headmaster of the Sydenham State School), who said in his report that the pupils passed a very satisfactory examination in the pass subjects required by the Government syllabus, lie congratulated the Sisters on the result of the first examination of this school, which is composed of children from different schools in the di-trict and who probably passed their last examination at different periods of the year. SPEAKINa in one of the Catholic churches in Wellington on Sunday Rev. Father Holly said the whole business of the prosecution of Brothers Kilian and Wybertus was a poor reward for years of devoted labor, in one case extending to 25 years. He acknowledged the impartiality and sense of responsibility shown by the juries who tried the cases. Out of all the jurors who sat in the seven cases only two, he said, were Catholics, and the counsel for the Brothers did not seek to have any. Dr. Mackin, of Wellington (writes the London correspondent of the Erening Star), having just finished a long course of bacteriological work at King's College, is now going to take a couple of months' holiday with his wife. They are going to do a trip round the Mediterranean in the Assyrian Prince, and will be absent about a couple of months, during which time they will visit Tunis, Cairo, Jaffa, Jerusalem, Beyrout, and several other historic places in the Eastern Mediterranean. They will have as a fellow-passenger the Very Rev. Dr. Watters, late Rector of St. Patrick's College, Wellington, who has improved greatly in health during his sojourn on this Bide. Our Greymouth correspondent, in describing the visit of the Right Hon. the Premier and Mrs. and Misa Seddon to the West Coast, says : The Premier paid a high oompliment to the generosity of the West Coasters in the matter of providing for the sick and aged poor, and showed from the books of the Greymouth Hospital Rome startling facta re amounts collected and the numbers of patients that passe I—7ooo—through1 — 7000— through the institution during the time the old doctor (father of the present medical officer, Dr. Charles Morice) had charge. — Great excitement (adds our correspondent) prevails on the Grey River over the return of 161 ounces of gold from the Grey River dredge. A Kumara correspondent writes under date December 19 :— A few days ago the priests of the West Coast portion of the Christchurch diocese presented Mr. and Mrs. O'Malley, late of the Bealey, but now of the Otira Gorge Hotel, with a beautiful and valuable canopied sideboard with bevelled mirrors and inlaid mottled silver pine, made specially to order and suitably inscribed. The many priests who passed over the ranges while Mr. and Mrs. O'Malley had charge of the Bealey Hotel were always sure of their being well looked after, the worthy recipients considering no trouble too great to insure their comfort. We feel sure this handsome article— which in itself is a work of art — will be treasured by Mr. and Mrs, O'Malley not on account of its intrinsic value, but more for the associations and memories it will often recall. Mrs. and Miss O'Malley will leave for Europe early next year for a twelve months' well-earned holiday, and we wish them a pleasant voyage and a safe return. ' Snider,' of the Cromwell Argtit of December 18 has the following comment upon the Stoke prosecutions : The Stoke case, which was eagerly snatched up by sensation mongers, as affording materials for a fierce campaign, partly religious but mostly hysterical, has quietly fizzled out, and the accused are found 'not guilty ' by a jury which did not contain a single Roman Catholic, so that its verdict could not be impugned on the ground of partiality. The cases simply show that the gentle methods that are usually efficacious with the children of decent parents and healthy home surroundings fail when used towards children of hereditary tendencies in the direction of evil. The ' Hooligans ' of London ara becoming a standing menace to the peace and safety of the metropolis, and the ' cat ' is recommended. The boys put in industrial Bchools contain in their ranks embryo ' Hooligans,' upon whom severity is the only treatment likely to besuccesoful, and supplejack the only signpost to point out the paths of rectitude from those of turpitude. As for the other charges brought, they are of a character that the debased youth gloats over, and is ever ready to manufacture against those he is not friendly with. The complete vindication of the accused does not surprise me in the least, nor should it surprise anyone at all conversant with the kind of thing that would appeal strongly to the depraved imagination and scheming oapaoity of a real bad boy. The result of the trials has been only what might have been anticipated.